An extreme right-wing right-to-life group came to campus today. I was in between classes and mostly over at east campus and thus escaped the full force of their onslaught but what I did see and later heard from students is depressing enough. The man and woman have a 10-12 year old child with them as well. They have two very big posters and several small ones and flyers galore — all depicting aborted fetuses–cut up arms and legs and bodies of aborted fetuses. They stand there calling students and faculty over and telling us that we are all going to hell if we are not Christians. We will go to hell if we support elective abortions. We will go to hell if we are Jews, Muslims, Hindus. We will go to hell  . . . there were some other things that will get us to hell as well, but I forget them now. I have taught four classes today.

Why is this allowed to happen on a university campus? Students are traumatized by the pictures and their conduct. The abortion-freaks are throwing bloodstained condoms around.  Apparently since we are a state university we cannot stop them from preaching this kind of nonsense on a university campus. They are protected by the right to free speech amendment.  What’s next in the right to free speech?

I had just arrived from India in August 1990 and I didn’t know many people at the University of North Dakota. I had met a few people in the English department but I was living by myself in Brannon Hall, one of the residence halls on campus. The Fall semester had not started, so the residence halls were not occupied yet–just a few students here and there, that was all. I ate my meals at the Wilkerson complex. One evening I was eating my supper at a table by myself–it was a beautiful early fall evening in Grand Forks and I was looking out the big windows and feeling generally happy.  (Every time people say that North Dakota is too cold all the time, how did you live there, I tell them how beautifully you can see the seasons there! You just need to know where to look.) So anyway I was minding my own business eating my supper when like in that Joni Mitchell song Raised on Robbery, this man walks towards me. He had perfect black hair. He had perfect teeth. His face glowed from a recent shave. He wore a suit. He looked like a car salesman.  He was smiling radiantly as he walked towards me. He pulled out a chair and asked me.”May I join you?” I said, “Sure.” I didn’t know what else to say. He sat down, stretched back and looked at me as if from a great distance and said,”You know I was looking at you and I told myself, that girl is lonely.” I was startled by that comment. “Really?” I said. “I am not lonely at all. I was just eating my supper and enjoying this beautiful day.” He continued smiling. “Did you move in already? The semester has not started yet,” he changed the topic. “Yes,” I said. “Where are you from? You are obviously not from here,” he smiled. I wanted to ask him why is that? Why can’t I be from here? But I didn’t. Instead I said, “India.” “Really?” He became excited. “I have good friends in India.” I smiled politely. “You know I just returned from Africa myself,” he continued. I smiled politely again turning to my food.  He wasn’t allowing me to eat my supper. “I was in Nigeria.” I smiled again. I thought if I didn’t say anything he will go away. “I am a missionary,” he announced suddenly out of nowhere. I looked up and waited. “Have you accepted Christ into your life?” he asked me. He had a sudden personality change. I didn’t know what to say. “I have read some books of the Bible,” I said. “I love The Song of Songs, The Psalms, Book of Job, Gospel according to Mark, Revelations,” I said. “It is very beautifully written. I love the parables” I said. He listened then leaned forward and asked me pointedly staring into my eyes, “But have you  accepted Christ into your life as your personal savior?” I thought for a moment. “No,” I said.  “I have not.” He leaned back in the chair contemplating me again from a distance, a satisfied look on his face. I waited. “Jesus died for your sins, do you know that?” he asked me. I was puzzled. “Really?” I said. “What sins?”  “We are all sinners,” he said. “We are sinners the moment we are born,” he said. I was really beginning to get annoyed now. “Look,” I said. “We are not sinners the moment we are born. A child has no sin whatsoever. Even if we make mistakes later in life as adults, we can always correct them. We owe that to each other, all of us. Jesus does not have to die for us,”  I said. He looked appalled at what I said. “What is your religion?” he asked me. “I was born in a Hindu family, but we are not particularly religious” I said. “Do you know that unless you accept Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior you will go to hell?” He was dead serious. I was beginning to find all of this really amusing at this point. “Listen,” I said. “I have not committed any sins. Even if I do, I hope whoever I hurt through my words or actions would forgive me. And I am not going to hell. I am going to heaven.” He looked aghast. He pulled out his wallet and searched inside and brought out his card. He took some flyers from his inside coat pocket. He laid them in front of me and got up. “We are having an informational meeting next week in Smith Hall. We hope you will join us. You will learn all about the joys of accepting Jesus into your life,” he said. Okay, I said. I will check it out if the time works out for me. He left.

I never went to the meeting. Maybe I love God for all the wrong reasons–the stories, the songs, the architecture, the feelings of clarity, goodness, oneness and love–but I find it simply inconceivable that you would use God as a threat and frighten people into belief. What is that saying in the Gospel of John: “Whoever does not love does not know God. God is Love.”